Date: 14-25 June 2013
Venue: Bédeille, near Toulouse, France
Programme and action: Youth in Action, action 1.1. youth exchange
Participants: Tomáš Votruba, Monika Antošová, Jana Kohoutová, Jan Samec, Tomáš Seidl
Project report:
The project took place in a small village near Toulouse. On Friday, 14 June in Bedeille met a bunch of the best people from France, Estonia, Slovenia, Portugal (or Brazil), and five crazy Czechs ϑ
On the introduction we played some very funny game in which we found that these 10 days will not be bored. Environment from a first look a bit scary, but I think in the end everyone enjoyed it. We slept in tents (really just asleep, otherwise we had the whole day doing something). Toilets were dry and out (no problem), outside shower (at 10 degrees a little problem, but we survived J), outdoor kitchen – it was pretty much we enjoyed cooking outdoors.
The activities of this project: We have tried to play Torbalı, which is a ball floe for the blind, where 3 players from one team seeks the help of audio-treated ball to score a goal the other team consisting of three players. It was great fun. On a nearby farm we rented a horse and went for a ride, which was also very nice. And we tried a tandem bike, I’ve personally tried it with tape over my eyes and it was very interesting.
A lot of games that we played, including live images I could also apply to the children’s camp, which I attended shortly after the project and it enriched me a lot. For example, vivid images when teachers portray the plight of children have it repaired. I was very surprised with how the children coped in France.
In the evenings, our crazy group that met at the outdoor seating and we did have such a small reflection, then we could have fun together even till 8am, when we decided that we might as well go to sleep. Every night was something special, because we have international evenings, when the representatives of the States represented their country, culture, food and drink. So after we ate vegetables all day (which suits me perfectly), we have evening crammed to bursting :).
What I really liked was visit organizations Braille, where we can test ourselves and how to write on a special machine. 10 days on the project with visually impaired people in Bedeille ran like water and immediately after my arrival, I began to search the Internet for other projects and maybe even longer.
We made wonderful group and almost all are still in touch. This project was my first and definitely not the last.
Thank you to the organizers, the organization that sent us a thank you for a great experience and a lot of other options open!
We look forward to your next project!
For the Czech team: Jana Kohoutová
